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Microsoft

Windows 9 Already? Apparently, Yes. 1009

Posted by samzenpus from the gift-that-keeps-on-giving dept.
Nerval's Lobster writes "A little over a year after Microsoft released Windows 8, and a mere three months after it pushed out a major update with Windows 8.1, rumors abound that Windows 9 is already on its way. According to Paul Thurrott's Supersite for Windows, Microsoft will begin discussing the next version of Windows (codenamed 'Threshold,' at least for the moment) at April's BUILD conference. 'Threshold is more important than any specific updates, he wrote. 'Windows 8 is tanking harder than Microsoft is comfortable discussing in public, and the latest release, Windows 8.1, which is a substantial and free upgrade with major improvements over the original release, is in use on less than 25 million PCs at the moment.' Microsoft intends Threshold to clean up at least a portion of Windows 8's mess. Development on the latest operating system will supposedly begin in late April, which means developers who attend BUILD won't have access to an early alpha release—in fact, it could be quite some time before Microsoft locks down any new features, although it might double down on Windows 8's controversial 'Modern' (previously known as 'Metro') design interface. Yet if Thurrott's reporting proves correct, Microsoft isn't abandoning the new Windows interface that earned such a lackluster response—it's betting that the format, once tweaked, will somehow revive the operating system's fortunes. With Ballmer leaving the company and a major reorganization underway, it'll be the next Microsoft CEO's task to make sure that Windows 9 is a hit; in fact, considering that rumored 2015 release date, shepherding the OS could become that executive's first major test."

Submission + - SimCity to finally get offline update (engadget.com)

Submitted by slashdotpaul
slashdotpaul writes: SimCity 2013, after a rocky launch and months of anticipation and stories, is finally going to receive Update 10, which will bring with it a single player, offline mode. Engadget wrote:

This is a pretty major change considering all the noise made about SimCity depending on cloud computing to run, and creative director Lucy Bradshaw saying "significant engineering" would be required to take the game offline. It's not completely clear how the offline mode will work, though we do know it'll add a single player mode and offer local saves.

Although we lack other details about Update 10, it's fantastic to see EA finally come to their senses and actually listen to the player base.

Submission + - Bank & Gov't Agency coordination, "To keep you safe" (dailydot.com) 2

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: New details have surfaced regarding the surveillance protocols used by Bank of America to keep tabs on social activists. Last year, Anonymous hacktivists published 14 gigabytes of private emails and spreadsheets which revealed that Bank of America was monitoring social media and other online services used by activists for basic communication. This time however, information about the bankâ(TM)s recent surveillance activities were obtained legally through a public records request by a single petitioner. The newly published documents reveal a coordinated effort by Bank of America, the Washington State Patrol (WSP), and federal counterterrorism agencies, to monitor activists as they prepared for a public demonstration in Olympia, Wash. Over 230 people originally signed up to attend the âoeMillion Mask Marchâ event, which was organized by the Anonymous movement and took place on November 5, 2013.

Queue the refrain: "If you have nothing to hide..."
Power

Record Wind Power Levels Trigger Energy Price Fall Across Europe 226

Posted by Soulskill from the any-way-the-wind-blows-actually-really-matters dept.
New submitter Forty Two Tenfold writes "Electricity prices across Europe dropped last month as mild temperatures, strong winds and stormy weather produced wind power records in Germany, France and the UK, according to data released by Platts. The price decline was more marked in Germany, where the average day-ahead baseload price in December fell 10% month over month to €35.71/MWh. On a daily basis, December was a month of extremes for Germany, with day-ahead base prices closing on December 10 and 11 at less than €60/MWh – the highest over-the-counter levels seen all year – only to fall to its lowest level December 24 to €0.50/MWh."

Comment Crop circle (Score 1) 128

by game kid (#45877735) Attached to: Nvidia Announces 192-Core Tegra K1 Chips, Bets On Android

I definitely thought the crop circle was manmade, given the design and the reports that said a group of people were in the area. I thought it was more an independent attention-whore art-prank, though; nor did bells go off in my mind that the Braille "192" meant a 192 core processor either (though it obviously was a processor or circuit board by appearance).
GNU is Not Unix

Emacs Needs To Move To GitHub, Says ESR 252

Posted by timothy from the this-way-to-the-bazaar dept.
hypnosec writes "Eric S. Raymond, co-founder of the Open Source Initiative, has recommended that Emacs should move to another version control system like GitHub, as bzr is dying. In an email, Raymond highlighted the key reasons why he believes that Emacs should move. Raymond said that bzr is moribund; its dev list has flatlined; and most of Canonical's in-house projects have already abandoned bzr and moved to GitHub. ESR believes that bzr's codebase is sufficiently mature to be used as a production tool, but he does mention that continuing to use the revision control system will have 'social and signaling effects damaging to Emacs's prospects.'" Update: 01/06 20:50 GMT by U L : ESR did not suggest Github the proprietary hosting platform for git, but rather git the version control system. Which is actually already available on Savannah (the bazaar repository is automatically synced with the git repository).

Comment Re:so (Score 3, Insightful) 114

by game kid (#45843627) Attached to: 100-Year-Old Photo Negatives Discovered In Antarctica

Well it is an Antarctic "fucking hut", so I imagine they'd prioritized that just a bit under "maintain climate observation equipment", "take new pictures", "inquire about those sparse supply shipments", and "avoid freezing ass off".

They've improved at all of 'em, but bad things still happen, so forgive them for not heading over to fetch some (historically important) photos hastily enough. There are reasons Scott ended up in that hut. :)

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